Monday, 28 January 2013

From Allmusic.comIn the late '60s, where Gilberto Gil and Os Mutantes headed, many other groups followed. Thanks to the good folks at World Psychedelic Funk Classics, we have 16 more tracks to file right beside the best of Os Mutantes. Most of them are spot-on examples of the form, complete with wall-of-guitar fuzz, piercing lead guitar, reverbed vocals, psych organs, drum kits bashed beyond belief, and numerous references to pop culture or drugs (the opener is a cover of the Batman theme). Lloyce e Os Gnomes get in the best Mutantes impression, with a song from 1969 called "Era uma Nota De," but there's much more quality material than that, including Fábio's funky "LSD (Lindo Sonho Delirante)," rough-hewn Brazilian soul with Serguei's "Ourico," and the psychedelic female pop "Cinturao de Fogo" by Marisa Rossi. Some of the tracks here from the '70s feature a bluesier, funkier backing than Mutantes -- in similar company to their earlier volume, Psych Funk 101 (1968-1975) -- often sounding as much like Rare Earth as Sly Stone. And, although virtually all of the tracks come from a four-year window between 1968 and 1972, the compilers wisely chose an odd track from 1976 that turns out to be a mostly unrecognizable cover of "God Save the Queen" by a group named 14 Bis (likely not the same 14 Bis that formed later in the '70s).

"High Wolf's fractal psychedelics evoke the infinite geometry that can be
perceived anywhere in the natural world, if you look close enough.
Traverse the path into the forest. It is damp from a recent shower.
Drops of water rest on a leaf, magnifying its skin. You observe the
distinct pattern of its venation. You imagine sucrose pumping like
blood, tucked under the microscopic layers of what can be seen. Or is
the blood below also visible? Or haven't you seen it before, where your
own inner arm bends? It is true that the same basic elements compose
organic compounds which act as fuel for both lives. You suddenly notice
you have been leaning gradually closer to the leaf, and you feel an
inexplicable compulsion to lick away its beaded coat. The urge quickly
subsides, almost as if the plant has commanded it. You realize you are
already connected to this creature, and its energy, as it senses your
proximity, amplifies the bond. The particles that give you shape are
rearranged in the plant -- and, indeed, in all things -- to trigger
unique dynamic structures. The leaf is a symbol of the natural world
that surrounds you. It is a pattern repeating, but it is also alive,
its adaptations infinitesimal, undetectable."

Saturday, 26 January 2013

Consequences of Sound: Everything you need to know about Grimm Reality is right in its cover art. Three interlocking images—a leafless tree sprouting out of a man’s head, a fish dropping out of an open umbrella, and a black balloon wrapped around an outstretched skeletal hand—represent wildly disparate ideas and styles forced together into a single composition. And that’s what Swiss producer Dimlite’s third album is, sonically—a mishmash of bugged out hip-hop, space funk, and psychedelic pop, genres in their own right, woven into one fascinating and deranged record for Egon’s Stones Throw sub-label Now-Again. For the most part, Grimm Reality picks up where Dimlite’s first two releases for Now-Again left off, but this time, he’s chasing a more colorful and full sound. The album moves with such dizzying speed, twisting and turning constantly over the course of an hour, that it’s impossible to get bored; Dimlite never settles on a particular sound or style at any point, allowing songs to end at a very different place from where they started. The best example is “One of Uh Infinity’s Countless Uh Tiny Cycles”, which knits together synth drones, an unwavering drumbeat, whirling organs, and distorted bass and ends in a gorgeous string arrangement that has absolutely no connection to the four minutes that came before it. The song shouldn’t make sense, but somehow it does.But Grimm Reality isn’t about throwing random clips into the air and watching where they fall; this is controlled madness at its very best. Like Egon, Dimlite seems to have a knack for digging up some of the most obscure and wonderful sounds and holding onto them until precisely the right moment, and then, and only then, he deploys them most expertly. Grimm Reality by Dimlite

Friday, 25 January 2013

drowned in sound: Grumbling Fur consist of Daniel O’Sullivan (Ulver, Guapo, Mothlite, Miasma & The Carousel of Headless Horses), Antti Uusimaki (Mothlite, Panic DHH), Jussi Lethisalo (Circle, Pharaoh Overlord), David Smith (Guapo, Miasma & The Carousel of Headless Horses, The Stargazer's Assistant, Amal Gamal) and Alexander Tucker (Alexander Tucker) ... The result of a day-long improvisation, Furrier starts quietly with the first few tracks comprising of hazily claustrophobic loops, gleaming guitar drones, subtly processed chimes, noises reminiscent of somebody running their wet finger around the edge of a half empty wine glass, and some unobtrusive, wraithlike vocals. After this humble beginning, the scattering jazz drum intro of ‘Curling Hides’ acts as the real starting pistol and from this point the Fur engage themselves in an accomplished and also very English take on Krautrock. Their hypnotic grooves seem to be complemented and to some extent grounded by sentimental evocations of England’s rural as well as its industrial past. Imagine Faust or Can having a jam whilst lost somewhere in the Pennines on a damp, grey day just as their Kendal mint cake kicks in. ‘Bears Wandering into Milky Chapel’ perhaps takes matters a little too far. The lengthiest track by far, its shimmering guitars seem too shy and uninspired, its loud, prominent symbols a little distracting. Flat, directionless and indulgent, it takes a long time to decide where it wants to go, and this destination eventually turns out to be some sinister but slightly silly drone-metal vocals. Elsewhere, however, it is all pulled off rather comfortably. The drums are at times nautical brushstrokes, at others a pulsating, motorik engine, and during ‘Siberian Priest’ there’s even some fairly unembarrassing bongos. Guitars flicker between dense drones, chugging strides, and lighter, pastoral subtleties. The chanting, choral vocal parts work better than the occasional growling, though most of this is low enough in the mix not to distract or interrupt. It is for the most part glued together seamlessly and skilfully by these accomplished and admirable, if not 'exceptionally successful', players. All in all, a fur-oughly enjoyable record.

"Imagine Brian Eno wandering into a studio with Can and Don Caballero, the lot of them cradling drones and textures, sounds that swirl in circles, stop in one place and then flit the opposite way. Horns that arc like whale calls and guitar bleats like sirens, beats that are too complex to be human but too graceful to be a machine. Picture all those things knotted into a sonic tapestry that's jarring and mesmerizing at the same time, beautiful and confusing, comforting but somehow unsettling. You'd be approaching what Laddio Bolocko created over their short lifespan, but not quite doing it justice. The New York quartet formed in the late '90s and split in 2001, releasing three discs you'd likely have come across only if you saw the band live. Which, anyone who did will attest was akin to walking in on the Aurora Borealis captured within the walls of a dive bar - beautiful, captivating and wonderfully overwhelming... Altered states suit it best, but Laddio's music essentially provides it's own headtrip" - CMJ New Music Monthly

Thursday, 24 January 2013

SWEET SMOKE were a 70’s Progressive Rock band who spent more time in Europe than in the Continental US. Along the way they managed to bump into Conny Plank who Co- engineered this album with Klaus Lohmer. SWEET SMOKE combine fusion jazz elements (aka Miles Davis) with German Krautrock elements and with the addition of flute and sax gives a Canterbury feel as well. Vocals are present and quite psychedelic sounding actually at times with some banter and chanting going on. This album is essentially 2 long epic tracks oscillating between blues, jazz, rock, funk and psychedelia. Band was Andrew Dershin (bass), Jay Dorfman (drums and percussion), Marvin Kaminowitz (solo guitar, vocals), Michael Paris (Tenor sax, alto recorder, vocals, percussion), Steve Rosenstein (rhythm guitar, vocals). With the length of the 2 tracks there is lots of room for exploration and an almost improvised feel to the movements. On track 2 “Baby Night” there is a simply killer percussion solo which sounds like solar drums and will absolutely blow your mind. This is truly awesome music and is heavily recommended to lovers of prog-psych rock.
(by James Unger - http://www.progarchives.com/)

Wednesday, 23 January 2013

From Scaruffi (9/10):
The guiding theme of Modern Dance (Blank, 1978 - SIlver Line, 2006) is that of alienation and anxiety in the industrial society. Mutatis mutandis, Pere Ubu take the fear of the nuclear holocaust and transplant it into a different scenario, in which death is not physical but spiritual, not due to bombardment but to economic and social mechanisms.
Their sound starts out from the spirit of old-style garage-rock,but distorts it with harmonic and rhythmic grotesquery. The surreal lyrics and the student humour attenuate the dramatic force of the performance, but at the same time increase the feeling of collective madness, of resigned fatalism, of ineluctable slavery. It is, mutatis mutandis, the same rational fear that seized the young of the post-war era, when the atomic threat held everybody in suspense: now, however, the situation is more real, because industrialisation has already reaped its holocaust, and more grotesquely, because it has been able to do it with the complicity of its own victims.
Their "modern dance" is composed of free-form phases (woodwinds, cacophony of the keyboards, rattling guitars, psychotic thrills) alternating with sudden powerful rhythmic flarings, veritable flashes of hallucinatory violence in the calm of the urban neurosis, in which Thomas gives vent to his raging vehemence. The schizophrenia of the singing is the schizophrenia of the sound as a whole.
The work opens with the piercing hiss of Non Alignment Pact, which plunges into a furious, deafening bacchanal of cryptic slogans, ungainly vocals, discordant strumming, electronic distortions and primordial pulsations, in a grotesque dance of bodies possessed by the restless, exhausting rhythm of a tribal ceremony. The sound of the Modern Dance is a devolved funk, primitive and technological, which reproduces the ambience of the office, the cyclic movement of the throng, the smoke of the factory chimneys and the inorganic bawling of the mob, and cadences the working day like a real mechanism, while the singing vibrates in despair to the hammering rhythm of the dance. It is a dramatic, perturbing fresco of the condition of working life, although unfolding to an almost jovial rhythm. The use of "concrete" sequences and electronic sounds, as a means of emphasising the climate of tragedy, makes it the archetype of the "sound collage" for the entire new wave. The third great rock and roll song of the disc is Street Waves, swept by an ominous wind (which evokes the miasmic gust after an atomic explosion) and driven at supersonic speed by a stop-start rhythm. The braying of Thomas and Herman's machine-gun fire ride the infernal pandemonium, giving it the stamp of a prophetic vision of the apocalypse.
The forebodings of the larger trilogy also inform the android litany of Real World (syncopated rhythm, buzzing interference, metallic, discordant guitar), the slow spirit-dance of Over My Head, pregnant with agonised suspense, and the clownish, desperate disco music of Humour Me and Life Stinks, which throw Thomas's incoherent cry and bubbling synth into the general uproar. The ferocity and the icy obscurity of these emotionless ballads place them at the antipodes of the original spirit of rock and roll.
The eclecticism of their sound is demonstrated by Laughing, which opens with a mini-jam of free jazz for winds, guitar and drums, and suddenly explodes into another mad and brutal boogie fanfare. Even more disarticulated and chaotic is the harmonic tissue of Chinese Radiation, with wandering guitar chords, Thomas's unrestrained raving and his epileptic fit in front of an exulting audience and then piano notes amid general silence. Sentimental Journey, chamber music for breaking crockery, disconnected phrases of synth and a somnambulant lament, is nothing other than a random mass of dissonance in the proudest traditions of psychedelia (once the experiments with gestural musique concrŠte are taken into account), but it is also a manifesto of Dadaist music, of music akin to screeching and hubbub. A singular hybrid of emphatic agit-prop (but without militant intent), of deformation by overdose (but without indulging in the emotions of the trip) and of aleatory music … la Cage (but without his academism), Ubu's Dadaist piece is a product of the industrial civilisation, its perversions and its anxieties. And Thomas, who dissertates imperturbably in the most absolute chaos and in the end remains alone raving amid the fragments of crockery, coins a new type of absurdist lied which might be the analogue of folk in the industrial era.
An extreme synthesis of the anarchic and the rational, a troubled projection of obsessive libidos and negative emotions, the body music of Pere Ubu pivots on the expressive crudeness of the singing, on the ungrammatical syntax of the electronics and on the ludic impetus of the rhythmics. It gives voice to the expressionist howl, to the informal chaos of abstractionism, to the commercialism of pop art. Cultured and primitive, refined and naif, Ubu march under the banner of contradiction, perhaps thus pursuing the ultimate end of pataphysics, the science of laws that regulate exceptions. Altogether their sound is very innovative: the singing of Thomas is uncouth in the worst "Beefheartesque" tradition, the rhythm section grinds out a paradoxical rhythm, a rough and elemental danceability, to the twisted accompaniment of Herman's primitive, strange and hypnotic guitar playing, and Ravenstine injects crude and anti-aesthetic effects, using electronics in a way antithetical to that of flash-rock or of disco music (anti-melodic and anti-rhythmic, earthy and disarticulated), as an ironic counterpoint to the maniacal anxiety of the band.
Thus unbalanced, the music is ambitious enough to function as the soundtrack of the industrial landscape of Cleveland, and, by extrapolation, as that of the holocaust, of the "final solution". Theirs is a philosophy of auto-destruction. The references to Jarry's pataphysics are not accidental; they allude to the sense of deformity, of the absurd, of the grotesque (which is never burlesque), of the brutal cynicism which informs the relations beween the inhabitants of the ruins of technology.
The modern dance of Pere Ubu is a funeral rite for humanity after the catastrophe: there is the anguish of an inescapable fate, there is the agony and the delirium, the slow decay into the shapelessness, the immaterial chaos of the soul. They are visions of the Apocalypse sung by survivors, gangs of hooligans roaming the debris, faces ravaged by the explosion which and surges and vanishes in miasmic gusts, barbarians advancing in a jungle of tangled piping and electric wire. They are dark and indecent ballads, with a neurotic rhythm of hisses and clangorous crockery. The voice of desperation and madness, of disgust and violence, rises, impetuous and scornful, above the hubbub of the Universal Judgement.
The musical references are innumerable: the most down-at-heel garage psychedelia, an urbanised version of Beefheart's vandalic blues, the most spectral and chaotic free jazz, the tribalism of primitive peoples, musique concrŠte modernised and fused with an abundance of electronic contortions and vocal acrobatics in a harmonic babble laced with blasphemies and laments.
Modern Dance is a pagan representation of the end.

Tuesday, 22 January 2013

MUTANT SOUND: " Sonically almost the archetypal Cherry Red band, over the course of this LP, Glaxo Babies wide-ranging post punk admixture manages to take in everything from mutant funk, nebulous atmospheric jams, sax squawk-driven post punk improv, dub technique, and itchy-scratchy Gang Of Four angularity and fuses it all in a way thats beautifully un-obvious."

WIKI: Glaxo Babies were a Bristol-based UK post-punk group, formed in late 1977by Tom Nichols (bassist), Dan Catsis (guitarist) and drummer Geoff Alsopp (previously Nichols and Alsopp had been in another Bristol based band called The Vultures). The initial band line-up was completed by Rob Chapman (singer) joining in November 1977, and their first gig was held just 3 weeks later in The Dockland Settlement, St Pauls, Bristol. The band signed to local label Heartbeat Records (marketed by Cherry Red), with their first release being the This Is Your Life EP in February 1979. This led to them recording their first session for BBC radios John Peel the following April,[2] and the track "It's Irrational", from this session, opened the seminal 1979 Bristol Compilation album "Avon Calling". For this release the band had been forced by pharmaceutical company Glaxo to change their name, and this resulted in the use of "Gl*xo Babies", with an asterisk replacing the "a", although subsequent recordings have used a mixture of the two forms.Tony Wrafter (saxophone) had joined the band in early 1979, and in May 1979 drummer Geoff Alsopp was replaced by Welshman Charlie Llewellin. This line-up had just started to record their debut album in June 1979 at Crescent Studios, Bath with David Lord as engineer. However, due to artistic differences Rob Chapman promptly left the group after the recording of just a couple of run through tracks (including a song about Christine Keeler, former Prime MinisterHarold Macmillan and the political scandal known as the Profumo Affair).Following the abrupt departure of Rob Chapman the other four members, supplemented by Tim Aylett (and later Alan Jones), took the band "into a more experimental area, leaning more towards a free-form fusion of jazz and dance rhythms",[3] which resulted in them recording, in one day, the album Nine Months To The Disco. By the time this recording was released in March 1980 and reached No. 8 in the UK Indie Chart,[4] the Gl*xo Babies had disbanded. Initially Tony Wrafter left, then Dan Catsis and Charlie Llewellin, all three of them going on to found Maximum Joy with Janine Rainforth, and John Waddington formerly of The Pop Group (Dan Catsis had also played in The Pop Group during 1979 and 1980 as a replacement for Simon Underwood). Rob Chapman joined The Transmitters, with whom he recorded one LP, “And We Call That Leisure Time”. The single of Rob Chapman singing on Christine Keeler was released in 1979 on Heartbeat and in 1980 Shake (The Foundations) was released as a single off Nine Months To The Disco. Another Peel session had been recorded in February 1980[5] and the 4 tracks were released later that year onY Records as the “Limited Entertainment EP”. Heartbeats final Glaxos’ release was a compilation album of early demos and unreleased tracks from the Rob Chapman period, called “Put Me On The Guest List”. In 2007 the Japanese label Birdsong reissued both of the bands albums on CD: “Nine Months To the Disco” included the extra track Swampstomp and “Put Me On The Guest List” had Christine Keeler, Nova Bossa Nova and Because Of You (Live) as bonus tracks.

"Higgs' second solo CD, Ancestral Songs (Holy Mountain, 2006), contained
six psalms of transcendental psychedelia for
guitar, banjo, jew's harp, toy piano and voice,
imbued with esoteric religious imagery:
the spectral Living in the Kingdom of Death,
the ten-minute Thy Chosen Bride for banjo and voice, etc.
The jew's harp returns to haunt his meditations in Moharsing and Schoenhut and Time-Ship of the Demogorgon.
Much of the album was born at the intersection of
simple repetitive hypnotic acoustic guitar riffs and
shaman-like invocations and set in a wasteland of decaying distorted sounds."

From http://theredhippieteenager.blogspot.it/2012/04/july-july-1968.htmlJuly is the First and Only Album by the English Psychedelic-Rock Band July.
For a number of years it was thought that the Band originated from a group called The Playboys. They originated in fact as The Dreamers who played much in the style of The Shadows and The Everly Brothers. With the success of R&B they changed their name to The Tomcats, drinking from the Sounds of Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley. In 1965 another Band called Second Thoughts came to an end (Their Lead-Singer Patrick Campbell-Lyons going on to form the Band Nirvana). From the ashes of this to Bands, The Tomcats were re-formed. With the lack of success in London the Band decided to relocate to Spain, where they performed on the best Venues the Country had to offer (In Madrid, Barcelona and the Canary Islands). They also released a number of EP's that were quite well received there, getting to the Spanish Charts. With the return of the Band to London and the creation of new Material influenced by Psychedelia. Soon after the definitive change to the name July, they got a Recording Deal with Major Minor Records and a Management Deal with Spencer Davis. Their First and Only Album came out that same year (1968) and was completely ignored by everyone except for some critics who deemed it a “complete waste of plastic”, They broke up right after the release. However many of the Songs were later used on 60's Compilations and the Album itself has been re-issued a number of Times. It is one of the most sought-after Psychedelic Albums ever.
Best Tracks - “My Clown”, “Dandelion Seeds”, “Jolly Mary”, “You Missed It All”, “The Way”, “Move On Sweet Flower”, “Crying Is For Writers” and “Friendly Man”. A fantastic example of British Psychedelia. Pure Psychedelic-Rock without that annoying Pop tinge that affect most Obscure Psychedelic Albums.

Monday, 21 January 2013

From SubPop.com
The first public appearance pairing Christian Henjes and Juergen Gleue (inspired by and with names derived from LSD-25, they would become CH-39 and JG-39) was in 1976, at the Dada Nova (a space occupied by Otto Mühl’s AAO commune) in midtown Hannover, Germany. Dada Nova would be a space of enduring clash. From the subtlety of a shat upon organ to the ejection from communal meetings by bodily force, the AAO would display that the presence of the 39 Clocks was one of their constant grief.

Known for pranksterism and the destruction of the clubs in which they would perform, friction in every form would continually follow the band. In 1979 they were thrown out of a show in Kassel at Dokumenta (their sounds had disturbed Joseph Beuys). They created an outrage (they wrote a tune with the title “Art Minus Idiots”) at the Filmtage Hannover with their avant-garde Super 8 movies made under the disguise of director Zachius Lipschitz. Rumour claims that at a Hannover show at the Cafe Glocksee, they played the vacuum cleaner and a circular saw instead of guitars, and there was even a knife throwing incident in Bremen.

Inspired, then, clearly, by protest in the broadest and most romantic sense (they wrote a tune with the title “Radical Student Mob In Satin Boots”) theirs was a sound attuned to classic American Punk / Nuggets. Although, this is not Bomp Rock; theirs was a thrust that purposed deconstruction and reassembly in the most modern sense. This collection was put together with the non completeist in mind (originals of some of these records are as rare as Italian underwear), intending to display the general 39 Clocks vibe, but also some of their more curious wrinkles. And as the Clocks were always interested in where they were going and not where they’d been, the chronology here is strictly reversed. Diedrich Diedrichsen wrote the first review of the band (in Spex), and we at DeStijl are very pleased to have had him scribe liner notes.

From Scaruffi:
Italy's main contribution to the psychedelic era was Le Stelle di Mario Schifano, a musical event put together by decadent-futuristic pop artist Schifano the same way Andy Warhol put together the Velvet Underground. They improvised a cacophonous 18-minute jam, Le Ultime Parole di Brandimarte (with the instructions "to be listened with the TV on and no volume"), off their only album Dedicato A (1967), one of the most experimental tracks of the time.
After a few seconds of voices and noises, someone intones a fairy-tale madrigal. It lasts only one minute, after which a fibrillating mass of sounds and percussion invades the stage. There is no reference melody, just a shrill keyboard being played rather childishly, like everything else. After eight minutes, a guitar riff becomes dominant, despite the general chaos. The tribal percussion gets louder. The organ distortions duel with the guitar. Each and every instrument competes for sonic space the way wolves compete for the flesh of the dead prey (here the "dead prey" being classical harmony). After sixteen minutes, the guitar restores a bit of order and intones a solemn theme, but it is already the end.
The rest of the album pales compared with this masterpiece. Emotions surface in Susan Song, a madrigal accompanied by a pastoral flute and a distant piano. Intervallo is more or less a Bob Dylan-esque tirade a` la Rainy Day Women minus the words.

Sunday, 20 January 2013

FUJAKO came out of the clash of Jonathan Uliel Saldanha and Nyko Esterle, two producers obsessed with echo, bass and space. The first one, raised in Portugal and part of the collectives Soopa and Mécanosphère, deals with sonic alchemy, and is also known as HHY. The second one, raised in France, part of the Radon collective and a rider of the sound waves, is also known as Ripit. LANDFORM, their first record (out on Wordsound Digital and Angstrom Records) was born in a small stone house studio in the burnt forests and mountains of Portugal, between paradise and the gate of hell, made from soundscapes and beats recorded on mostly acoustic instruments, created in an hostile -yet natural- environment. A landslide of voodoo Dub evoking phantoms and bass cultist conjurations. After the initial production phase in the woods, LANDFORM was then haunted by the voices of several guests such as Sensational, Seraphim, Native, Cheravif and Scalper, as well as by the additional trash turntablism of DJ Urine.

Saturday, 19 January 2013

"This is Rai Music from Algeria as you've not heard it before. In the early 1970's, a new group of singers and musicians were operating on the northwest coast and what they pioneered was a sound that eventually reached worldwide status by the end of the decade, however their names are relatively unknown to this day outside Algeria. This crucial and defining period of the development of Rai is criminally ignored and overlooked by Algerian music historians and Raï's fans. Due to censorship and government controlled music diffusion, this scene and lyrical style was forced underground and banned from broadcasts yet slowly built a small following around the seaside cabarets of Wahran (Oran). The early 1970's witnessed the rise of artists such as Groupe El Azhar ("The Flowers" group) and Messaoud Bellemou, who can comfortably be considered the godfather of the modern Raï's sound. His group, L'Orchestre Bellemou, rewrote a heritage of centuries by using modern instruments and especially the trumpet which became, during the 1970's, the backbone of the Wahrani genre. Reinterpreting the gasba melodies on trumpet, Bellemou backed singers such as Boutaiba Sghir & Sheikh Benfissa who carried on the lyrical tradition of their forefathers singing about daily preoccupations and problems as well as love affairs, alcohol, or simply owning an automobile! Toward the late 1970's, Cheb Zergui brought a newer ingredient: an electric guitar with a wah wah pedal. Thankfully, the late 1960's saw the development of vinyl pressing in Algeria. This new industry allowed many small artists including the Wahrani "scene" to record and release singles documenting their repertoire. This compilation is a selection of the Proto Raï's scene's vinyl 45s. The LP is limited to a one-time pressing of 1500 copies on 180 gram vinyl and comes in a full color gatefold jacket with photos of the musicians & informative liner notes by the man who compiled it, Hicham Chadly." http://www.sublimefrequencies.com/

"Sun Araw is pretty hip right now, Heavy Deeds
made it onto a surprising number of “Best of 2009” lists (mine
included). Sun Araw is one of the most original/innovative artists I’ve
heard as of late. I’m probably overstating things, as his music is
arrestingly simple, but that’s the beauty of it.

Sun Araw is the
solo project of Long Beach musician Cameron Stallones, who plays guitar
for Magic Lantern. What draws me Sun Araw is this overwhelming sense of
humidity to the music. I’m not one to use meteorological terms when it
comes to describing music, but if you give it a listen I’m fairly
certain that “humid” is as close to hitting the nail on the head as it
comes. You can try to break the music down to its components: the
gnarly guitars, the commanding, perpetual bass, the never-ending organs,
the trippy vocals, but in actuality what you have is fairly simple;
funk music.

This isn’t a modern update of the funk of the 70s. What Stallones has captured on Heavy Deeds
is like a faded polaroid; a personal, nostalgic memory of an essence.
Everything is oversaturated, and bleeds into everything else. The
vocals are so drenched in effects, you’d be lucky to make out a single
line of words per song. But that doesn’t matter in the least, as their
emotion is clear as day.

A certain amount of patience is required
with these songs, you have to let them consume you. It’s pretty easy
to let that happen with the thick bass. This is my rip of the CD, which
features a bonus track that was originally the Sun Araw side of a 12"
split. It doesn't really fit with the album, it actually does a great
job at disrupting the flow. I just couldn't exclude it however. The CD
is limited to 500 copies, the LP to 600 copies."

From Sycamoreage.com ..a short introduction to Sycamore Age by Valentina CiddaSounds and words that give voice to the mud and the light that we are, that evoke hope and disenchantment, bifida sirens and bewitched ponds, appointments with destiny and dark forests that seem to come alive, places of the "elsewhere" where they are celebrating the "Day of the Scarecrow" and space-time where the absence becomes a presence and the presence becomes a constant suspension. A short and intense immersion in the places of dream and vision, where the dream shades off into the poetic frenzy of a warlike mind, because of courage or fear, a mind that goes beyond the rigid lines of any reason, a mind amused and desperate, just looking for a new faith into the fable, into the myths, into the archetype which becomes ideal and sound material.Between and sounds generated by objects of all kinds - confetti of ceramic, wooden sticks, fists on the furniture, forks on a grater, programmable music box, lids, spoons and cutting boards, - combined with the continued and expanded presence of numerous instruments - theremin, bouzouki, strings and all sorts of wind instruments, pianos and double basses, electronics, warm percussion instruments of every kind and snowy steppes of electric guitars - enigmatic characters, moving and ironic, disillusioned and dreamy characters, they go along their way, asking maybe harrowing questions, aimed, ultimately, to postpone the questioner always and only to himself...A small tribe that runs, for the duration of SYCAMORE AGE album like a compact fluid into a vein made up of epic and fairy-tale matter. Dazzled faces, dazzling bodies, maybe referable to a tremulous "us "..."Us", beautiful and terrible and forlorn humanity, "us" who may be the grand finale of the species, we who, perhaps more than during all the centuries that have gone before us, we have the perception of the supreme doubt, the knowledge of the inexorable existential angst...Listen: Soundcloud https://soundcloud.com/sycamore-ageWatch: http://vimeo.com/43134528Buy: http://www.audioglobe.it/disk.php?code=8016670147046

From http://silveraintr.blogspot.it/2010/12/claudio-rocchi-volo-magico-n1-1971.html"This is in my opinion Claudio Rocchi best work and one of the best italian psychedelic rock albums of all time.The album has only 4 songs but what songs.The short La Realtá Non Esiste and Tutto Quello Che Ho Da Dire are sweet melodic and intimate with only Claudio Rocchi and his piano.Giusto Amore is longer,clocking at about 13 minutes,this time with the full band playing.Claudio made this song up while they were playing so this is basically an improvised jam and last the song which gives the name to the album.In this song or even better suite being 18 minutes long, there is everything that makes psychedelic music great.It starts with a few notes of an acoustic guitar then is just a crescendo, you get celestial voices,eastern sounds,hippie messages and screming and howling guitars and finishes with the sweetest notes a piano can play,it really is a magic flight.The quality of the recording is not the best but in this case,who cares,what is really important is the quality of the music and in Volo Magico there plenty of that.So give it a try,it is really worth it. " - Franco58 - SilverainTRYoutube: Full Album Streaming from thegreatprogita channel: http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=qItKh0dK7l4Music: from Silveraintr Blog: http://silveraintr.blogspot.it/2010/12/claudio-rocchi-volo-magico-n1-1971.html

Friday, 18 January 2013

"One of the most original bands to come out of Los Angeles during those
fervent years was Savage Republic,
led by guitarist Bruce Licher. Tragic Figures (1982) introduced a
psychedelic and industrial music that was mostly instrumental and percussive,
inducing trance and fear. The EP Trudge (1985) incorporated more
explicitly elements of world-music. The atmospheric Ceremonial (1985)
and Jamahiriya (1988), featuring new member Brad Laner, perfected
their synthesis of psychedelic drones, middle-eastern cantillation and tribal
rhythms. By the time of Customs (1989), their last album and their
masterpiece, they had coined a musical language of extreme tension,
instrumental subtlety and exotic appeal.."

From Allmusic.comScotland's Country Teasers are one of those rare bands that put forth an image through their lyrics (and crude, childish cover art) that is so repugnant that even the rare music fan who enjoys them is often reluctant to admit it. Walking the delicate line between frigid irony and blatant attacks on humankind, Ben Wallers' scratchy voiced sing-speak takes aim at the world in what might be considered the musical equivalent of Jonathan Swift's Modest Proposal. It is with this in mind that one can begin to believe that Wallers' in-your-face songs about women being inferior, black men being sexually obsessed, and Satan being Wallers' only friend are a tongue-in-cheek way of making the listener realize how absurd things like racism and sexism truly are. Musically, Satan Is Real Again is a better-realized version of the fractured honky-tonk punk of 1995's Pastoral -- Not Rustic. While the ragged, discordant, twangy treble of the guitars is not what Guitar Player magazine might consider good, it is this slightly off-kilter approach that makes them appealing. Much like the lyrics, one gets the distinct impression that the band's clear mastermind, Wallers, knows exactly what he is doing, crafting songs that are at once abrasive and melodic, tuneless and catchy. Perhaps it takes more skill to make music sound this accidental than to orchestrate soulless pop. Over a mangled riff lifted directly from Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir," Satan Is Real Again's second track, "Black Change," tells a story of a white man who gets an injection and becomes the stereotypical black man he once feared. Perhaps the album's best song, the jaunty "Thank You God for Making Me an Angel," should be embraced as a feminist anthem (in anti-feminist disguise) smarter and wittier than anything Kathleen Hanna has ever written. In the song, Wallers proudly lists reasons he's glad to be a man rather than a woman, citing things like "I can drink whiskey and stay on my feet/walk by myself at night in the street/don't have assholes whistle at me/I can pick up big things because I am strong/I can sing about bitches in my song." Saucy.

From ratb0y69 blog:
Stoneage Romeos was iconic Australian rock group Hoodoo Gurus' first
album (released 1984) and saw them receive record sales to complement
their already strong reputation for live performances. The album name is
from a Three Stooges short film. With radio and television support for
their third single "My Girl" (1983) (complete with a film clip about a
greyhound of the same name), the band's following grew. The album's
other singles were - "Leilani" (1982), "Tojo" (1983), and "I Want You
Back" (1984). Later in July 1985 they took the honours in the 'Best
Debut Album' category at the 1984 Countdown Awards.

The
Australian LP sported a cartoonish nod to the 1966 caveman flick One
Million Years B.C., all menacing dinosaurs and Day-Glo colors (designed
by Yanni Stumbles); whilst in America, consumers got a stylized sleeve
featuring arty renditions of the giant reptiles.

Thursday, 17 January 2013

"In 1972 Fricke converted to both Christianity and Hinduism, and decided to
move even further away from electronic instruments, preferring
the most humble acoustic instruments over high-tech devices.
A new line-up, centered around the angelic wails of Korean soprano Djong Yun,
recorded Hosianna Mantra (Pilz, january 1973) in a Buddhist meditative
tone, showing a solemn and elegant way to bridge
the Western mass and Eastern meditation.
Fricke on keyboards,
Amon Duul II's guitarist Conny Veit,
Between's Robert Eliscu on oboe,
Fritz Sonnleitner on violino, Klaus Wiese on tambouras
build up ascetic atmospheres that catapult the listener into Tibetan or
Gregorian monasteries.
Most of the interplay is between the piano (tenderly caressed by Fricke) and
the guitar (whose phrasing simulates the Indian mantras). The other instruments
add evocative power to the music, rarely altering the flow, in a manner
similar to renaissance music. The key difference between this music and
classical or rock music is the repudiation of rhythm: Tangerine Dream was
removing rhythm (i.e., Time) from its cosmic soundpainting, and Popol Vuh
removed rhythm (i.e., Time) from its spiritual soundpainting."

From KillingMoon Blog:One of the definitive albums of The Paisley Underground -a music scene that was anything but clearly defined- Rain Parade's Emergency Third Rail Power Trip is an enduring and unassuming gem of post-sixties (neo) psychedelia. While taking inspiration from sixties Jangle-Pop purveyors such as The Byrds as well as the darker psychedelic textures of bands such as The Doors and early Pink Floyd, Rain Parade's debut is more than simply an homage to these psych-rock forefathers; rather, Emergency Third Rail Power Trip bristles with a spirit of inspired re-invention. Led by the Roback brothers and Matt Piucci, Rain Parade successfully integrate the blissed out Rickenbacker jangle of songs such as their first single, "What She's Done to Your Mind" with the dark haze of songs like "Look at Merri," which sounds like a blueprint for Jason Pierce's work with Spiritualized ten years later. On the Explosions in the Glass Palace EP, released the following year after David Roback had left to form Opal with Kendra Smith of The Dream Syndicate, the band takes a slightly more minimalist approach, even moving into Power-Pop territory on "Blue," which seems to conjure the ghost of Chris Bell for the lead guitar part. Despite this, the band also manages to come up with one of its best extended psych-jams, "Prisoners," which is a great mash-up of early and late Pink Floyd. Unfortunately, Rain Parade would never hit these artistic heights again, but their debut more than guarantees their status as a pillar of the neo-psychedelic movement.

Woody Jackson is one of the cult composers of the Los Angeles new scene. His very special rereadings of west and noir genres have been integral parts of the resounding success of two videogames such as Red Dead Redemption and LA Noire that sold more than 10 millions copies.

In great demand for soundtracks as for videogames as for full lenght movies and even for advertising jingles, Woody Jackson embodies at his best the figure of the modern composer, able to lend his own art and his inspiration to several “means”, keeping always and in any case a very high level of quality. Because of his being inspired by a classical type of soundtrack, from John Barry to Morricone, from Henry Mancini to Bernstein, he has always been considered as a “contemporary classic”.

Woody Jackson has taken part, as a composer and as a musician, in several Hollywood films, such as “The Devil Wears Prada”, “American History X”,”Youth in Revolt” (from the director of Six Feet Under), “Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny” (of the musician and director Liam Lynch, with Jack Black) and several works of Steven Sodenbergh, as “Ocean’s Twelve”, “Ocean’s Thirteen”, “Haywire” and “The Girlfriend Experience”; in some documetaries, as “Fast Food Nation”, “The Real Rocky” (documentary about Chuck Wepner, character inspiring Sylvester Stallone) and “Moog” (dedicated to Bob Moog, the famous creator of electronic instruments) and besides, in the short film “The Shore” ( winner of an Academy award as best short film)

The release of the new work, “Dos Manos” (a new soundtrack) is expected for july 2012, with the production of David Holmes and the patecipation of John Convertino (Calexico) and Sacri Cuori. The release will be on Interbang Records/ Brutture Moderne in collaboration with Strade Blu.

LA PIRAMIDE DI SANGUE is a seven musicians ensemble from Italy.The sound of the band is builded on two guitars, two basses, one clarinet, one synth, several effects, drums and percussions. The songs are a mosaic of meditative and restless sounds that could remind Sun Ra, Art Ensemble of Chicago, ballads with north-african taste, kraut rock rides under the sign of Agitation Free and Neu!Review from Sentire Ascoltare:

From Allmusic.comThe Quarteto Novo was a seminal group with a strong Northeastern accent. They brought the tradition of that region of Brazil and mixed it with the bebop jazz language, the result so influential that it broke cultural and physical barriers throughout the planet. It is possible to discern baião grooves in "Save the Last Dance for Me" by the Drifters, "Hound Dog" by Elvis Presley, "She Loves You" by the Beatles, and "Do You Know the Way to San Jose" by Burt Bacharach, among many others, not to mention the uncountable jazz renditions with that rhythm. Certainly modern, distinguished proponents of that genre, like Egberto Gismonti, have the Quarteto Novo to thank for that.In 1966, the Rhodia company wanted live music for a fashion event, hiring the violonista/guitarist/banjo player/viola player Heraldo do Monte, drummer/percussionist Airto Moreira, and bassist/violonista Théo de Barros and forming the Trio Novo. When composer Geraldo Vandré's "Disparada" was classified on TV Record's II Festival of Brazilian Popular Music, the Trio was assigned to accompany singer Jair Rodrigues, who would interpret the song at the festival. But, due to the contract with Rhodia, they couldn't perform in that venue and the Trio Novo effectively accompanied Jair Rodrigues at that festival, but under a different formation: Aires on the Brazilian viola, Manini on the drums, and Edgar Giannullo on the violão. After pianist/brass/flute player Hermeto Pascoal joined the trio, it became the Quarteto Novo, which recorded its only LP with songs by Vandré and the group's participants, for Odeon in 1967. The album Quarteto Novo won the Troféu Roquette Pinto and the Troféu Imprensa. The Quarteto Novo was then personally sponsored by an individual, Geraldo Vandré, who had a good salary as an inspector for SUNAB, a governmental agency. They toured Brazil as Vandré's exclusive group, being the backing group for Vandré on his 1968 album Canto Geral. The group also accompanied Vandré, a host of TV shows for TV Record and TV Bandeirantes of São Paulo. The group also backed Edu Lobo and Marília Medalha on Edu Lobo's winning composition "Ponteio" at TV Record's III Festival of Brazilian Popular Music. The song was recorded by Edu with accompaniment by the Quarteto Novo, the group also accompanied Edu on his European tour. The group disbanded in 1969 and the LP was reissued by EMI/Odeon as a CD in 1993.Listen Full Album on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y374WwqZtOIMusic: from BotecoDos Blog http://botecodosbloggers.blogspot.com/2009/12/quarteto-novo-quarteto-novo-1967.htmlBuy: Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Quarteto-Novo/dp/B0018TNINS

(No Pussyfooting) was recorded in three days over the course of a year. Its release was close to that of Eno's own debut solo album Here Come the Warm Jets (1974), and it constitutes one of his early experiments in ambient music."